The Making of Shane Carruth's Upstream Color

Shane Carruth hasn’t made a movie since his debut, 2004’s critically acclaimed time-bending Primer, but it wasn't for lack of trying: According to producer Casey Gooden, the filmmaker devoted a lot of time to getting another movie made, called A Topiary, after Primer. But when that didn’t pan out, Carruth began working on his next project, Upstream Color, which premiered at Sundance and played SXSW last night. “He was taking a lot of meetings for A Topiary, and that wasn’t moving along as fast as he had hoped,” Gooden said at a Q&A after last night’s screening. “He was frustrated working on that, and kind of just moved on, and started writing this. He really doesn’t show anything until he’s done. [But when] he showed it to me, I was like, ‘Let’s go make this.’ So that’s what we did.”

Upstream Color, which Carruth also directed and stars in, is a beautiful puzzle of a film. Worms, orchids, nematodes, and pigs are involved. But according to Gooden—who worked with Carruth on Primer—there is an internal logic to the film. “I read the script, so it was written plainly enough for me to understand it,” he said. And the final product is pretty similar to the script Carruth wrote. “The story was all there,” Gooden said. “There were some little bits and pieces that—it was a bit like, we learned along the way. There were some elements that we found and we used. But the story and everything was there.”

As if writing, directing, and starring in Upstream Color wasn’t enough, Carruth also composed the film’s score. “Shane composes music as he’s writing, so that [happened] early on,” Gooden said. “He had a lot of music put together, and some of it didn’t make it into [the film], but it was always a key element.” Carruth split editing duties with David Lowery, too. “We were midway through production, and we had started editing some, [but] Shane wanted to get more done,” Gooden said. “So David actually came in and Shane will say this—David Lowry saved his life. So David came in, and really worked with Shane. Shane edited some, David edited some, and they just hit it off. And David’s eye for things just really worked—it’s rare to find someone that creative to get on the same wavelength as Shane.”

Upstream Color opens in theaters April 5. To find out where you can see the film, click here.

Aliens have been depicted countless times in cinema, from Georges Méliès's A Trip to the Moon (1902) to James Cameron's Avatar (2009). But despite the advancements in special-effects technology over the past century, most aliens we see on screen still share a lot of similarities—mainly, they look, move, and interact with the world like humans do. Vox explains how the classic alien look came to be in their new video below.

When you picture an alien, you may imagine a being with reptilian skin or big, black eyes, but the basic components of a human body—two arms, two legs, and a head with a face—are likely all there. In reality, finding an intelligent creature that evolved all those same features on a planet millions of light-years away would be an extraordinary coincidence. If alien life does exist, it may not look like anything we've ever seen on Earth.

But when it comes to science fiction, accuracy isn't always the goal. Creating an alien character humans can relate to may take priority. Or, the alien's design may need to work as a suit that can be worn by human performers. The result is a version of extraterrestrial life that looks alien— but not too alien—to movie audiences.

So if aliens probably won't have four limbs, two eyes, and a mouth, what would they look like if we ever met them person? These experts have some theories.

In the Harry Potter series, many of Voldemort's horcruxes were give rich backstories, like Tom Riddle's diary, Marvolo Gaunt's ring, and of course, Harry himself. But the most personal horcrux containing a fragment of Voldemort's soul is also the biggest mystery. Voldemort carries Nagini the snake with him wherever he goes, but we still don't know how the two met or where Nagini came from. Fans may not have to wait much longer to find out: One fan theory laid out by Vanity Fair suggests that Nagini is actually a cursed witch, and her true identity will be revealed in the next Fantastic Beasts movie.

On March 13, the trailer dropped for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, the second installment in the Harry Potter prequel series written by J.K. Rowling. The clips include lots of goodies for fans—including a first look at Jude Law as young Dumbledore—but one potential bombshell requires closer examination.

Pay attention at the 1:07 mark in the video below and you'll see Claudia Kim, the actress playing a new, unnamed character in the film. While we don't know much about her yet, Pottermore tells us that she is a Maledictus or “someone who suffers from a ‘blood curse’ that turns them into a beast.” This revelation led some fans to suspect the beast she transforms into is Nagini, the snake destined to be Voldemort's companion.

That isn't the only clue backing up the theory. The second piece of evidence comes in the trailer at the 1:17 mark: There, you can see an advertisement for a "wizarding circus," featuring a poster of a woman resembling Kim constricted a by massive snake.

If Kim's character does turn out to be Nagini, the theory still doesn't explain how she eventually joins forces with Voldemort and becomes his horcrux. Fans will have to wait until the film's release on November 16, 2018 for answers. Fortunately, there are plenty of other Harry Potter fan theories to study up on in the meantime.